Every successful photo has three things in common, and they’re not particularly surprising. The proper aperture, exposure, and focusing distance? The right camera, lens, and tripod? Successful use of hyperfocal distance, ISO invariance, and ETTR? No! The three variables that matter the most in photography are simple: light, subject, and composition.

In my previous article for Photography Life, I wrote an article about stage photography, where I discussed some of the modus operandi I use to take professional stage photographs. That article was a lot more straightforward, technical, and objective than the one below. That’s because I’m hoping to explore the philosophical, cultural, and spiritual aspects of the creative process. It is less about the technical, and more about the inner journey of photography as an art form.

My favorite offshoot of landscape photography is flower photography. It is a bit easier to pursue than landscape, since you needn’t travel very far to get unique and beautiful images. All you have to do is step into your own garden or visit a public garden to find a world of beautiful flowers to photograph. But it takes skill – plus a little something extra – to be able to make really beautiful flower portraits. In this essay, I’d like…

In the first of a series of follow-up articles to The Quality of Light, I have posted this article to share a series of photographs (along with the thought processes behind them) that I hope will accentuate the interplay of light, directionality, shadows, and mood in landscape photography. As previously discussed, the directionality of light is a powerful factor in defining the quality of shadows, the contrast, textures, and three-dimensionality of a scene, as well as the mood and emotion that…

In a follow-up to a previous article, “A Study in Vision, Light, and Shadows”, I decided to share my thoughts and experiences on my most inspiring topic in photography – light. For simplicity, I decided to write about light in a narrow context from the perspective and experience of a landscape photographer, since outdoors scenes are what I gravitate to. Much of the analysis and discussion that follows is equally applicable to other genres of photography, such as portraits, macro, still-life,…

Have you ever seen a spectacular image and been flabbergasted when you saw that the photographer was an amateur – and they used their phone? Or looked at the website of a pro only to be disappointed by a slew of boring photos? Maybe you know someone who knows everything about photography has has perfect technique, yet still takes lacklustre images. Counterintuitively, being good at photography does not guarantee good photos.

Two months ago, while browsing the web page of an on-line analog photography store in Germany, Fotoimpex, I came across a link to a video entitled, “Silver & Light”, made by a brilliant artist named Ian Ruhter. The video takes the viewer inside the thought process and passion behind one man’s dream to create photographic art using one of the oldest photographic processes ever invented – the wet plate collodion. I found the story tantalizing and inspiring. Given the recent publication from our enthusiastic…